The United States Department of Justice and the State of California continue to clash over operations in Operation Protect the Vote, a coordinated effort among all four of the California-based Offices of the U.S. Attorney which focuses on protection of election integrity and combatting and rooting out fraud in U.S. elections. The operation has thus far swept up more than 28 foreign nationals in the net of election fraud.

OPERATION PROTECT THE VOTE

28 foreign nationals were charged in criminal complaints with federal crimes, including that they fraudulently registered to vote in U.S. elections, electoral contests in which most of them cast illegal and fraudulently obtained ballots.

This was a coordinated effort among all four California-based U.S. Attorney’s Offices to combat and root out fraud in U.S. elections and protect electoral integrity.

As our Managing Editor Jennifer Van Laar reported, on October 14, the State of California was given 48 hours to comply with a DOJ request to verify whether the more than 20,000 people discovered on the state's voter roll were citizens or not. Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter supplied California Secretary of State Shirley Weber and Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan with a password-protected thumb drive which contained the names, addresses, and dates of birth of those the DOJ believed to be noncitizens and as Van Laar documented, made simple requests:

Among them: 1) Not send a ballot for the November election to anyone on the list who hadn't already been sent one; 2) Set aside any ballots returned by people on the list; 3) Not tabulate any ballot returned by people on the list until their citizenship status could be verified; and 3) Verify the citizenship status of all of the people on the list.

California decided to California, and on Thursday, the DOJ filed a lawsuit ordering the state's compliance with federal law. First Assistant United States Attorney for the Central District of California Bill Essayli said, 

California election officials were given an opportunity to remove noncitizens from their voter rolls and to sequester ballots returned from suspected ineligible voters. They refused. We are taking California to federal court to demand that the votes of American citizens not be diluted by noncitizens. 

In reviewing Los Angeles' response to the lawsuit, Essayli highlighted a glaring admission: the Registrar-Recorder's office has no verification system in place. Like, none at all.

Massive concession: Los Angeles election officials just told a federal court they have no independent way to verify citizenship beyond what voters attest. (They simply take their word for it.) Under federal law, only citizens may vote in federal elections. Yet California has not acted on the list of 20,000 suspected noncitizens or agreed to set aside their ballots. American citizens’ votes are being diluted in California.

And have been diluted going on 40 years now. As Fox News' congressional correspondent Bill Melugin revealed, California could have been actively participating in the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) program, which was established in 1986 to verify whether a person was indeed a citizen of the United States or simply a foreign national legally in the country or an illegal alien. Thanks to California's sanctuary state policies, they ignored this tool and tacitly refused to use it.

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This is not exactly protecting the integrity of elections nor honoring the vote of your citizens. 

California could participate in the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) program, which has been around since 1986, if they wanted to verify citizenship, but the sanctuary state actively chooses not to. It’s been used verify citizenship for benefits since the 80s, and California used to participate.

Just like CA Gov. Gavin Newsom and AG Rob Bonta, SOS Weber continues to double down on this as a "political stunt" that will "disenfranchise thousands" of California voters.

NEW: CA Secretary of State Shirley Weber @CASOSVote comments on the DOJ's latest effort "Operation Protect the Vote", in response to Dept. claims that noncitizens are voting in CA.

Secretary Weber confirms her office filed opposition to DOJ's demands:

“At best, this litigation is a reckless political stunt. At worst, it threatens to disenfranchise thousands of Californians this election."

The Secretary also notes a recent filing by the Los Angeles County Registrar's office and it's review of a small sample of voters from the list of 20,000 registered voters.

Newsom's press office full of theater kids thought that snark would be the appropriate response.

California adheres to Federal Law passed by Congress in the 1990s [see 52 U.S.C. 20504(c)(2) (Section 5 of the NVRA)]

May want to brush up on your election law before tweeting.

Perhaps Second Assistant is more apt from now on?

Essayli is as clear on the law as he is on his role, posted the exact statute for the slow to process.

Federal Law

18 U.S.C. § 611: It shall be unlawful for any alien to vote in any election held solely or in part for the purpose of electing a candidate for federal office.

18 U.S.C. § 2: Whoever commits an offense against the United States or aids, abets, counsels, commands, induces or procures its commission is punishable as a principal.

Newsom's theater kids threw their gaslight net a bit wider. Now that Newsom has admitted that voter fraud is happening in his state, he still is playing stompy-foot because Trump and his DOJ are just a bunch of meanies... or something like that.

Any credible allegation of voter fraud should be taken seriously and investigated. 

 That being said, the action by Trump’s DOJ — charging just 28 individuals — suggests they have no evidence to back up their claims just last week of TENS or HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of illegally registered voters.

Yes, non-citizen voter registration and voting does happen in isolated instances — in California and the rest of the country alike — but it is so rare that the Trump admin is parading around town about .0001% of California voters.

If the feds were serious about this, they would have done this long ago — not in the middle of people voting, which inherently and needlessly sows distrust and doubt in our democracy.

The lawsuit is in the court of Trump-appointed Judge John W. Holcomb, and since we are two weeks out from the midterm elections, it promises to become more popcorn-worthy.